A good one to read and share - on how we talk about cancer, and how it affects our approaches to it, our conception and even our experience.
Battle metaphors are old and unhelpful, and we could do more to move on.
https://news.cancerresearchuk.org/shorthand_story/the-myth-of-the-battle/

Webinar Alert!
Join ENLIGHT & Arqus Alliance for a powerful talk on:

Science in Society: How Science Communication Benefits from Open Science
Monday, May 19
10:00–11:30 PM CET
Online – Registration Required
Speaker: Hildrun Walter (Uni Graz)

Explore how Open Science can boost public trust in science amidst global crises

Register now: https://videoconf-colibri.zoom.us/meeting/register/LNpT-y35RoqO5rENB2dfxA#/registration

Our own @BaerbelW traveled to Vienna for this year's #EGU25 General Assembly of the @EuroGeosciences

Baerbel herself did a couple of presentations in Vienna:

* Examples of Skeptical Science successfully collaborating with other organizations so as to better reach shared goals, get more gain for less effort. With so much reward, we're eager to do more.

* How Skeptical Science translates our content into 29 different languages, the challenges of maintaining a polyglot presence. You may be able to help!

Baerbel also kept a daily journal. It's loaded with links to scads of intriguing information presented at the assembly by many researchers, with teasers and organized for easy access.

Post facto virtual attendance , distilled and at our fingertips. :-)

#geoscience
#geophysics
#ScienceCommunication

https://skepticalscience.com/egu25-personal-diary.html?utm-source=mastodon&utm-campaign=socialnetworks&utm-term=sks

#News: Scientists call for #storytelling in #science to effectively communicate #climatechange and #extinction in order to push for urgent action. Time to connect data with emotion to inspire people. #Biodiversity #ScienceCommunication #SciComms https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2025/04/250402123035.htm?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=Palm+Oil+Detectives&utm_campaign=publer

Our newest #ScienceCommunication editorial is published today: detailing a sauropod dinosaur from Argentina with an unusually thin ilium. This came from revisiting the holotype specimen, highlighting the benefit of re-evaluating old fossils stored in museums.

Read the editorial here: https://doi.org/10.1080/08912963.2025.2492520

Read the original paper by Lerzo & Gallina here: https://doi.org/10.1080/08912963.2025.2482168

Interested in pursuing #SciComm as a profession? Then this new Master's program in Germany might be for you: tuition-free (also for international students), entirely taught in English, covering everything from #ScienceCommunication to #ScienceJournalism, #SciArt, public engagement and more.

https://www.hs-ansbach.de/en/master/science-communication/

Application period starts on May 1st.

You may have seen headlines today - such as in The New York Times - suggesting the possible detection of a biosignature on an exoplanet. It’s an exciting prospect, no doubt. But it’s also an extraordinary claim, and as the saying goes, "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" (Carl Sagan).

While the molecule in question is associated with biological processes, it’s important to note that non-biological (abiotic) pathways for its formation exist as well (see: Reed et al. 2024 ApJL; Sanz-Novo et al. 2025 ApJL). These results are interesting, but far from conclusive.

Scientists work within a robust framework to test such claims. This includes:

- Peer review and replication
- Community feedback and critique
- Cross-validation through multiple instruments and techniques
- Avoiding sensationalism in science communication
- Building consensus through sustained investigation

I am looking forward to hearing more from the exoplanet and astrobiology communities on these findings before drawing conclusions.

In the meantime, the ripple effect of bold headlines - like "Possible Signs of Extraterrestrial Life" - has already begun. A friend at the dentist this morning spotted a very misleading headline about this on Channel 9 News!

This is where science communication becomes critical: managing public interest and excitement without compromising scientific accuracy.

We should use moments like these to show the process - how scientific ideas are proposed, tested, debated, and refined - to broader audiences. Whether we’re talking about space, climate change, or pandemics, this transparency is essential to building trust in science.

Aliens make for a great headline, but the real story is in how we do the science.

Creationism is exhausting.

Anti-vaxxers are exhausting.

They just keep making the same stupid, flawed, or deceptive arguments over and over again despite these arguments being fully discredited.

And since every new generation joins the web and sees these old arguments *still floating around* you find yourself having the same conversations again and again and again...

It's just so fucking exhausting.

Fielding suggestions for part of my final project I'm doing for a Science Communication course: What are your favourite pieces of visual (i.e., film or TV) fictional media depicting infectious disease outbreaks/epidemics/pandemics?
#InfectiousDiseases #InfectiousDisease #Epidemiology #SciComm #ScienceCommunication

What happens when someone with a background in science studies and an interest in patient experience has to stay in hospital?

Some passing thoughts on illness as a boundary object following my recent stay in hospital with a broken leg.

(seemed a good way to revive my blog)

#healthCare #hospitals #ScienceStudies #Patients #STS #scicomm #sciencecommunication
https://literacyofthepresent.wordpress.com/2025/04/03/illness-as-boundary-object/.

Here is a sneak peek of Secrets in the structure - out now on Big Biology!

In this episode, we talk with Scott Edwards, the Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology and Curator of Ornithology at Harvard University. We talk to Scott about the new ways we can describe and understand large chunks of DNA that till recently we have not been able to characterize directly.

Art by Keating Shahmehri

Science Communication: The Basics by Massimiano Bucchi & Brian Trench, 2025

Science Communication: The Basics is an accessible yet critical introduction to science communication, which is viewed as the social conversation around science. It addresses why science communication matters, examines the evolution of theories and practices and explains concepts, myths, misunderstandings and challenges.

@bookstodon
#books
#nonfiction
#ScienceCommunication

So, the AMOC. You've heard of it? The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Current, which flows south to north along the North American coastline, transports heat from lower to higher latitudes and basically keeps northeast N. America and western Europe from freezing to death every winter and ensures that parts of western Africa get enough rainfall.

I bring it up because I want to talk about how media cover science and climate change.

First, AMOC isn't easy to measure. You'd need heat sensors in the ocean along thousands of miles, and we've only had something approximating that since about 2004. So scientists use measurement proxies like air temperature records to model its behavior. A lot of climate science works like this.

For a while, over the past 2 - 3 years or so, there have been a spate of articles based on a few studies reporting that their models showed the AMOC slowing down already, and that this boded ill for the potential for climate disasters for the various regions affected by it.

Then, a few weeks ago, another study was released, using a different model, which showed that the AMOC may not have slowed down at all. Yet.

Naturally this inspired another spate of articles, this time with titles like "Key Atlantic Ocean Current Remains Stable, Defying Previous Concerns" or "New Study Finds That Critical Ocean Current Has Not Declined in the Last 60 Years."

Yet, the study authors didn't say that their findings defied previous concerns. They believe that the AMOC will weaken and probably collapse during this century. They just had a model that showed it hadn't weakened yet.

We're desperate for good news, and the AMOC weakening slowly instead of quickly is good news because it gives us more time to slow down emissions etc. I'm just highlighting the whole process, and the media bias towards normalcy/unwarranted positivity (at least when it comes to #ClimateChange). Anyway, here's a good article explaining how and why the models ended up differing, and why the back-and-forth doesn't mean much ultimately. Good news is fine, but this... was not good news, just an anomalous finding that was treated that way by journalists.

https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/01/the-amoc-is-slowing-its-stable-its-slowing-no-yes/

Antteam visits FG high school

Close up of larvae and pupae of #pennyAnts
#ants #maurar #iceland #scienceCommunication
#UICELAND #biology #ecology #trampSpecies

https://maurar.hi.is/en/#pll_switcher

This will be a challenge to the fediverse connecting abilities: I need to make a costume of a #trilobite and of #Anomalocaris. I am looking for any help: someone has made one already and is happy to share the details, a costume designed willing to take up the challenge, a handwork hobbyist with a knack for sewing/cardboard magic who always want to launch their skills onto a bigger stage. We are making a #science show for kids as part of my #ERC project MindTheGap and we will be explaining #evolution using #fossils. #Cambrian fossils If you have any hints, contacts, old costumes, please get in touch. We are located in NL so we probably cannot commission costumes from overseas (too much risk of delay due to customs). #Outreach #ScienceCommunication #paleontology